SEVENTEEN

I sat in Reeve's car as we drove down the highway. There wasn't too much traffic at this time of night. Not that I cared. Pain was all I knew, the terrible ache of loss throbbed dully in my heart. Although my eyes were dry for the moment, I knew I hadn't done the last of my crying. It threatened to overwhelm me, grief as deep as what I'd felt when I'd lost my mom. Now… Kunsel was gone, too.

"You're taking me away from my life again," I sighed bitterly.

Reeve kept driving. "I know. I'm sorry…"

My hands clenched into fists as I sat in the front passenger seat, the hurt and sadness giving way to anger. Why was this happening again? I didn't understand it, the injustice of it, the unfairness of it all. I put my head in my hands for a moment, hating my father and Shinra for what they'd so cruelly taken from me. The life I'd built in Sector 8, my career as an actress, my friends, my home, and most of all… Kunsel.

"Why didn't you warn me!?" I glared at Reeve.

I knew it wasn't his fault, but at the moment, I didn't care. The pain and anger swirling inside me needed an outlet, and he was the closest I could reach. Everything I'd known, everything I'd built for myself, had just been shattered and torn apart.

His voice was steady, but I knew he was hurting, too. "I would have done that, but I had no idea your father was on to you. Cait and I have been watching his activities for months, ever since you left Shinra, but he never gave any indication that he knew where you were. However, I wonder now if that's what I was supposed to see…"

"What do you mean?" I demanded.

"Most of my surveillance was done on your father, to monitor how his search for you was progressing. But, unfortunately, I think he was a decoy. Your father knew, even while you were still there, that you and I were close, more than your normal boss and employee. He might have taken advantage of that, knowing that I would focus most of my spying on him—we all do it to each other to varying degrees, and we all know about it—and that I wouldn't be paying as much attention elsewhere as I should've been. Damn, I was such a fool…"

I thought I understood. "Scarlet. That bitch must've connected the dots after she saw me at LOVELESS. But why would she have waited so long to act? That was almost a year ago."

"Tonight's operation must've taken some planning," Reeve thought aloud. "I'm sure you saw how empty the streets were. They were trying to fence you in and pin you down. Remember, though, that Scarlet and your father have other responsibilities at Shinra. And once they figured out where you were and where you lived, there was no rush to go after you. You didn't have any reason to leave, after all."

"And every reason to stay," I muttered. "Scarlet must've set this up, knowing you'd have most of your attention on my father. They must've been counting on it. He's not smart enough to plan this out on his own, but Scarlet sure as hell is. And we fell for it."

Reeve sighed. "The important thing is that you're still alive."

My eyes narrowed. "But I've lost everything! Again! My home! My friends! My career! The man I love! All of it! I hate this! Why does this keep happening!? Why can't he just leave me alone!? Why couldn't you have seen what they were doing!? Why!? Why…?"

My voice broke then, and the tears came back, flooding my face as I sat there in Reeve's car and the life and love that I'd known fell further and further behind me. I cried until I was out of breath, and then I just kept quiet for the rest of the trip, emotionally drained and heartbroken as memories of better days filled my mind.

Eventually, we pulled onto an abandoned off ramp. Reeve used his Shinra ID card on the scanner to pass through the construction barrier that had been put up some time ago. This part of the elevated highway was still being built, but Shinra didn't seem to be in any hurry about it. We drove through and followed the road until it just stopped, hanging over the outer edge of the plate like the start of some invisible bridge to nowhere. It was the end of the line.

Reeve turned the car off, but we didn't get just yet. I looked at him. "Reeve, I… I'm sorry for lashing out at you. It's not your fault. You did everything you could for me, and I'm grateful. It's just… I didn't think I would ever have to go through this again."

"You don't have anything to apologize for, Jessica," he said.

"Thank you," I managed a weak smile. "So… why did we come way out here? Why not take the train?"

Reeve unbuckled his seat belt. "It's a good bet that Scarlet and your father are having the train stations watched, especially now that you've escaped from their little trap. But the trains aren't the only way you can get down to the slums."

"What do you mean?" I wondered.

"There's an old service elevator not far from here, just on the other side of the guardrail. It goes all the way down to the ground outside the gate to the Sector 5 slums. Not many people go in or out that way, so it should be safe. You'll need a keycard to get inside, but don't worry. Cait acquired one for you from the Shinra security office."

I unfastened my own belt. "How'd he have time for that?"

"I put some things together for you a while back," Reeve explained. "Just in case something like this ever happened."

"I appreciate it. I don't know what I would've done tonight without your help, Reeve. You and Cait. You've always been there for me. Mom would be grateful for all you've done."

His eyes closed for a moment. "I hope so."

"What is it between you and her?" I asked. "What happened?"

"Amanda was… important to me," Reeve said.

He opened his eyes, his gaze forward as his hands rested on his lap. I didn't understand his meaning at first. I knew they had been friends, close friends, for a very long time. But then I thought again about that day at the Sector 5 station when he and I had seen her off. How he and Mom had looked at each other.

And then I knew. "You loved her…"

Reeve nodded slowly. "I still do, Jessica. Very much. That's another reason I've always tried to help you as much as I can. Aside from being my goddaughter, you're also the daughter of the woman I love. I wasn't able to save her, but I promised her and myself I would do everything I could to protect you and keep you safe."

"Why did she marry my father?" I wondered.

"I've asked myself that question many times over the years. He and I both courted her, you know. It was where our long feud began. I tried to warn your mother about him, but she was convinced she could help him change and be a better man. And she didn't want to risk damaging our friendship if an attempt at a more intimate relationship between us didn't work out. So she chose to be with your father."

I thought then about what I'd read in Mom's diary, that final entry. And was sure Reeve didn't know how she had felt. I still had the book, it was in my purse since it was another thing I often kept with me. And as I looked at him, I made a decision. He deserved to know, however it might make him feel. Opening my purse, I took out the book, feeling it there in my hands one last time.

Then I held it out to him. "Mom kept a diary. I've read it, all of it. I came across things that I think you should know. At first, I wasn't sure if I should tell you, because I didn't know if it would hurt for you to see what's in here. But I think she'd want you to have it. You see, Reeve, she realized, at the end, that she'd made a mistake."

"What…?" he stared at me.

"She said that I was the only good thing that came from being with my father. And she also wrote that, once she and I were settled into our new life and were finally safe from him, that she… she wanted to make a different choice this time. A better choice. In the end, she chose you, Reeve. She loved you, too."

He took the diary and closed his eyes again. For a long time, he sat there, the book in his hands as he thought about what I'd told him. As I watched him, I gently laid a hand on his shoulder. Even though things hadn't gone the way either of us had wanted, we were still family. And I felt that lump in my throat harden again as I realized I still had another hard goodbye to say. Two, actually.

Eventually, Reeve opened his eyes, a small, bittersweet smile on his face. "Thank you, Jessica. This… this means a great deal to me. It hurts a little, but it also helps. To know that she loved me, that she wanted to give us a chance to be together… it makes her absence easier for me to bear. I miss her, just as you miss Kunsel."

I had to fight back more tears at the mention of Kunsel. "I know. It won't be easy, but… I think we'll both heal… in time."

"We will," he agreed.

After a moment or two, we all got out of the car. Reeve opened the trunk and took out a dark gray backpack. Then he unzipped it to show me what was inside. A few changes of clothes—plain things that would fit in down in the slums, not the fancy dresses I'd gotten used to having on up here—a pair of sturdy brown boots, a few small, carefully sealed bags of nonperishable food, and a small toolkit.

"A few things to help you get started," Reeve explained.

I raised an eyebrow. "What are the tools for?"

He handed me the keycard to unlock the gate. "I thought your old skills might be useful down there to help you get by."

"They might," I nodded.

I wasn't sure how I felt about that, though. I had stayed away from computers and tech stuff for the most part since I'd left Shinra. With all that had happened there because of my work, I hadn't felt comfortable with it. I had needed time away from it. But now, it seemed like I didn't have a choice but to put those skills to use again. Hopefully, the results would be better this time. I needed to know I could use what I knew to do good, to help others instead of hurt them.

Reeve pointed past the guardrail behind him. "The lift is right over there. It was used to move heavy construction materials in between the plate and the slums, back when Shinra was still building this place. It's virtually abandoned now, but the elevator still works. It's quite large, so you can't miss it. You should… get going."

I put my purse inside my backpack and zipped it shut while Reeve closed the trunk of his car. Cait stood nearby, his long tail swishing idly behind him. Setting my backpack down on the ground for a moment, I scooped him up into my arms, tears spilling from my eyes as I hugged him. I couldn't help giggling a little, though, as his whiskers tickled my face. He could always make me smile.

"Goodbye, Cait," I sniffled. "I'll miss you…"

"I'll miss ye too, lass," he said. "Don't forget, ye can always call mae with yer transmitter. We'll be here for ye."

When I let go of him and put him down, Reeve took his place. As I held onto him, I cried, the enormity of what I was doing hitting me all at once. Aside from Aerith, if I found her, I would be alone in a world I didn't know or understand. I felt lost, adrift, and lonely. Ever since that first day at Shinra, Reeve had been there for me, an anchor keeping me afloat in these turbulent years. But now I'd been cut loose, and I had no idea where I would end up. I looked up at him.

"Thank you," I wept. "Thank you… for everything."

His own eyes weren't quite dry. "You're welcome, Jessica. And good luck. Please take care."

"Will I ever see you again?" I asked.

"I don't know," Reeve tightened his embrace. "I hope so."

I wiped my eyes. "So do I, Reeve. So do I…"

"Goodbye, Jessica…" he whispered.

I hugged him. "Goodbye…"

Reluctantly, I let go of him, put on my backpack, and walked away. After I stepped over the guardrail, I turned around for a moment to see them still standing there, watching me. I lifted a hand and waved, tears sliding down my cheeks. They waved back, and then I turned away and started walking again. A moment later, I heard the car doors open and shut and the engine start. I stopped and listened as it drove away, and I didn't move again until it was gone.

I was alone. Completely, totally alone.

Adjusting my backpack on my shoulders, I went on until I reached the elevator. It was huge, as Reeve had said, and enclosed in thick glass walls fitted with metal frames at the corners. The doors slid open when I got close enough, and inside was a large, blocky panel with only a few buttons, all lined up in a column. Swallowing, I pressed the one on the bottom. It was round, black, and cold.

The doors closed, and the lift started to descend with a slight jolt. I watched out the windows as I went down, the elevator taking me away from the world I knew and into one I didn't. To one side, over the outer wall, the rocky badlands stretched into the night. And on the other, the underbelly of Midgar slowly came into a view, a sight I'd never seen but would never forget. The huge central pillar, and the eight smaller ones in a wide circle around it, one per sector.

It was a quiet journey and seemed to be longer than it was. I felt so much loss and emptiness, and it grew the farther away the lift took me from the plate. I felt so alone. More than anything, I wished Kunsel was there with me. I wished none of this had happened. All I wanted was to be back home with him, safe in his arms. But that was gone now, all of it. And he… he was gone, too.

He had stayed up there on the plate to protect me, to save me, even though it had meant sacrificing our future together, our dreams for all we might've had with each other. All I had left now were the memories, ones I'd always cherish. Those and all the messages and photos we had shared. They were still on my phone.

I'd have to get a new one to keep from being found again because it was likely that Scarlet and my father knew this number by now. I'd also have to hack into it soon and disable the location trackers embedded in the firmware. I'd still keep the phone, though. There was so much of us on it—the selfies, other photos, and little love notes that we'd sent each other every day. I couldn't bear to lose all that.

I missed Kunsel terribly and knew I always would. He had become my whole world this past year, and between him and my acting, I'd had a wonderful, exciting, and happy life in Sector 8. But now it was gone. I didn't want to believe it. But it was. My world and my life had just been ripped away, and all I could think of was what I'd lost.

My eyes stayed on the plate as I continued to descend.

The first thing that hit me was the smell.

As soon as I stepped outside the lift and onto the barren ground by the high, semitransparent wall that separated the slums from the dusty badlands, my hands flew to my mouth and nose. I coughed for a good five minutes, bending over as my eyes burned. It was like some terrible cocktail made out of alcohol, bleach, and ammonia. Was this… mako? I'd never gotten close enough to the reactors to get a good idea of what it smelled like, but I didn't think it could be anything else.

When I had recovered enough to move on, I went over to the gate. It wasn't very far from the elevator. After I swiped the keycard through the reader, the door slid open, and I walked into the slums. There were a lot of shadows amidst the piles of junk and scrap metal that lined the dirt trail, and the only light came from a lonely streetlamp standing off to one side. It wasn't very bright, though.

Before went any further, I stopped for a minute to put on the boots Reeve had given me. I didn't know what might be laying on the ground in this place, and I didn't want to get my bare feet any dirtier than they already were. I also found a few pairs of socks in my bag, so I put them on, too. When I was ready, I slid my backpack onto my shoulders again and started moving slowly down the path.

I saw the church long before I actually got to it. It was old, just like Kunsel had said, with broken blocks of stone lying around outside of it. The place seemed to be more or less intact, though, but as it came into view around the corner, I saw something really odd about it. There was a huge, gaping hole in the roof, toward the back, and filling up most of it was a rocket, of all things. It stabbed through the slanted red shingles nose downward like a giant finger.

When I got to the church, I pushed open one of the wooden doors and went inside. The floor creaked under my feet as I walked across its faded planks. A row of rounded stone columns, some of them broken, stood at regular intervals along either side of the sanctuary, meeting in curved arches at the tops, and beyond them, the stained glass windows were dark at this time of night. I was sure that in the daytime, they'd be a nicer sight with the sunlight shining through them.

From the rafters high overhead hung several unlit chandeliers, and two columns of old wooden pews sat silently on both sides of the aisle. On an elevated dais at the back of the church sat a modest altar, and on either side, a large, faded red tapestry hung from the wall. There was a small door on one side that must've led into the steeple.

But the strangest and most curious thing of all was the wide patch of flowers growing out of the floor in the large space between the front row of pews and the dais. The floor itself had been torn out in a rough circle and the planks tossed aside so the flowers could grow right from the soft patch of ground underneath.

Setting my backpack down on one of the front pews, I walked right up to the flowers to get a closer look. They were mostly white, red, and yellow, with an occasional blue or purple blossom, and looked like they were well cared for. So this was where she grew them. Their scent filled the whole sanctuary, and I realized with a start that the air was actually fresh in here. I took a deep breath and let it fill my lungs, glad to be rid of that mako stench at least for a little while.

Aerith wasn't here yet, so I figured I must've gotten here before her. So I sat down on the floor in front of the flowers to wait. But as I gazed at them and inhaled their nice fragrance, thoughts of Kunsel, of my life on the plate, the time we'd spent together, how he'd always watched me on stage, being under the lights—they hit me in an instant like a punch to my stomach, and the tears burst out again.

I buried my head in my hands and wept. I hardly even noticed the sound of the door opening, of soft, booted footsteps walking across the floor toward me. I kept crying, barely aware of it as someone sat down next to me. But when Aerith slid an arm around my shoulders, I rested my head on hers. She took me into her arms, and I poured out my grief in one pained sob after another.

Aerith never said a word. She simply let me vent the pain and hurt and loss that I felt. Standing up, I went over to the nearest column and started pounding on it with my fists, even kicking it a little. I was angry as well as sad, furious and heartbroken, blinded by tears as I yelled and cried again and again, over and over.

My hands and feet hurt from doing it, but I didn't care. Neither did the stone column. So I kept unloading on it, sobbing and smashing, my nose a faucet as rivers ran from my eyes, until I finally wore myself out and slumped back down to the floor. I sat there in front of the column, my hands and feet throbbing and my heart hurting more than either of them, and tried to catch my breath.

Aerith sat with me again, her hand returning to my shoulder, and I took it, tears still spilling down my cheeks one after another in a steady stream. I just couldn't seem to stop them as my chest kept hitching and I kept sniffling. And then I realized I wasn't the only one. I looked over and saw that Aerith's face was wet, too.

"Why… why are you crying?" I asked.

She wiped her nose. "My friend's in pain. She's suffering. And I feel for her. Because I've been where she is."

I hugged Aerith tightly, grateful for her empathy, compassion, and understanding and glad for her company. And as I did, I finally calmed down, letting everything out in a long, deep breath. I felt hollowed out inside, drained, and tired.

"Thank you…" I murmured, letting go of her.

She smiled, went over to her basket where she must've put it on the floor earlier, and took out a box of tissues. As she came back to me, she opened it, pulled one out for her, and offered me the box. I took a few tissues and wiped off my face as she sat down, set it in front of us, then dabbed at her eyes and nose. When she was finished, she put our used tissues in one of the pockets of her red jacket.

Aerith took my hand. "You're welcome. I know it's hard right now, what you're going through, but things do work out in the end. So don't give up, Jessie. I've got a feeling there's a reason you're down here, aside from what happened tonight."

"What do you mean?" I wondered.

She stood up, put her hands behind her back, and took a few steps. "Oh, the planet works in mysterious ways. You might say it's alive. And it knows what it's doing. So I think this is where you were meant to be, Jessie. Take some comfort in that."

I joined her. "But why here? I don't understand."

"I wish I could say," Aerith answered. "But I really don't know. Call it intuition if you want. I do know that the places we're supposed to be in aren't easy, but they are right."

"I suppose," I said. "So what do I do now?"

She picked up her basket. "Here's the plan. You're gonna come back to my house and stay with me for a little while until we get you on your feet again. I know Mom won't mind."

I shook my head. "I couldn't. I don't want to impose."

"Don't you worry about that," Aerith brushed off my concern. "You need a friend as well as someone who can teach you all about life in the slums. And that's me."

"Thanks, Aerith," I managed a weak smile.

She hugged me. "You're not alone, Jessie. And things'll get better in time, trust me. They won't be the same, of course, but you'll be alright. There's always hope. Remember that."

I nodded. "I will."

"Good!" Aerith grinned, letting go. "Now, shall we go?"

I picked up my backpack. "I'm ready."

She took a few steps, then stopped and snapped her fingers. "That's right, I almost forgot! You should change out of that dress if you can. It wouldn't be good to walk around down here in something like that, I'm afraid. The slums aren't exactly safe."

"I've heard about that," I said, opening my bag and taking out some of the clothes Reeve had packed me.

Aerith turned around while I got changed. "Thugs and bandits and worse all wander around down here. I really like your dress, Jessie, but I'm afraid it does stand out like a great big sign just asking for someone to rob you. Best not to take any chances."

I put it in my backpack. "What about yours?"

"Mine's a bit on the plain side. Colorful, but ordinary. Doesn't stick out here. Yours looks pretty expensive, though, and in the slums, that'll get you attention you don't want."

"Guess that's my first lesson, huh?" I chuckled.

Aerith grinned. "Yep! Oh, actually it's the second. Your first lesson is, always listen to Aerith!"

I laughed and gave her a mock salute. "Yes, ma'am!"

"That's a good sign, you know," she smiled.

"What is?" I asked.

Aerith gave my shoulder a playful punch. "That you're smiling and laughing. You're going on, in spite of what's happened."

"I'm still hurting, though," I said.

"I know, and you will for a while," she agreed.

She was right. "Yeah. But I have to keep moving, keep going. I can't let what you, Kunsel, and the others did for me be for nothing. I'm not sure what's ahead, but I'll manage. Somehow."

Aerith winked. "Exactly! You'll be okay, Jessie. Ready?"

"Let's go," I told her.

I straightened out the plain green shirt and blue jeans I had put on and tightened the laces on my boots. The clothes fit well enough, and I was glad Reeve had given them to me. But if this place was as rough as he and Aerith had told me it was, then I decided I might need to come up with something a bit more practical and protective.

Giving me an approving smile, Aerith led me back up the aisle. On the way, she picked up a plain, slender staff that she'd left by the doors. Then we went outside. It was still dark, and the mako smell was still in the air, but the place itself didn't seem quite as bad as it had earlier. As I walked with Aerith down the dirt path, I knew why.

I wasn't alone anymore.